Archive for the Events Category


Yurithon at Otakuthon 2019 Event Report

August 19th, 2019

Once again, I had the genuine pleasure to attend and panel at the Yurithon programming track of Otakuthon, in Montreal, Quebec.

Otakuthon is a large general anime convention, held in the Palais des Congrès in downtown Montreal. For people like myself, who enjoy touristing in a city as well as attending the event, Montreal is near-perfect. (With one exception – the construction is ridiculous. Whole streets in what is meant to be a walkable town are ripped up and blocked off. On Gay Pride weekend, while Otakuthon is on, in the middle of tourist season in August. Great idea, Montreal.)

My wife joined me on two panels, the amusing “Yuri Court” game, where we prosecute or defend Yuri series and the traveling to Japan as a Yuri Otaku panel. For the History of Queer Manga, we has Historian James Welker, who was absolutely brilliant and fascinating. And of course I ran my Must-Read/ Must-Watch panel, letting folks know about good stuff coming out right now that they should be reading. (I will try to get this up some day in the near future, but I make no promises.)

I tried to sit in on the Queer webcomics panel but no one arrived to run it. I briefly considered jumping in, but thought it wouldn’t be fair to the folks looking for gay content, as it’s not really in my wheelhouse.

4 Panels over 3 days is perfect. Enough to keep me busy, to provide a chunk of programming, but also give me time to shop! The real benefit of the Otakuthon Dealer’s Room, is that it is very large, with a big Artist’s Alley. I always meet new folks there. This year we spoke with Koyamori, Lollipop Sisters, both of whom had really unique art.

This year we bought one piece of original art by Kelli Kiakas, from her Giggly Game series in which she draws the childhood games we played in the style of 1930s comic/animation art. We bought “Marco Polo” because it made us both laugh.

"Marco Polo" Giggly Games Series, by Kelli Kiakas http://foolishcaptainkia.com/site/

We had multiple amazing meals, including a poutine at a fancy French restaurant. It was reallly gooood poutine. Best we’ve ever had. Yes, there can be a “best.” ^_^ Here’s a rundown of the weekend’s food:

Biiru
Japanese izakaya(ish) featuring what James named “wafusion”. Exceptional.

Bistro Boris
French, beautiful garden seating, amazing food. Very, ridiculously dark. We needed phone flashlights to read the menu. The poutine we had here was the best we’ve had. Pattie had foie gras, I had duck risotto.

The cafe at Le Westin Hotel (we can’t find the name. Not the Gazette, but the cafe by the Saint-Antoine Tower elevators) has good coffee and croissants and were super friendly. The vegetable tartin was spectacular.

Reuben’s
Montreal’s version of Junior’s. Smoked meats, yum.

Now the fun part, where I will assuredly skip someone and break their heart. Many sincere thanks to everyone who made this event an absolute blast: Meggie and Kim, once again gracious and cute conrunners. James for joining me on panels, for the first and, I hope, not the last time. Fujimoto Yukari-sensei for coming to the panels and to dinner and just being a delightful person to speak with. Mark for being a great laugher and long-time Okazu friend. We look forward to more French-language manga reviews from you! Nick T for being someone I was delighted to meet in person. I had been on his Nickcast some months ago and we had so much fun. It was a genuine pleasure to put a face to the name.  Special thanks to Severine, for conveniently being in Montreal while I was there; dragging you into the colorful world of anime fandom and shiny cosplay was a delight (and smoked meats are always a good thing.) I want to shout-out to Sam Pinansky of the J-Novel club, who are putting out a bunch of Yuri novels! And of course, my wife who is brilliant and funny on panels and all the time.

If you attended any of my panels, thank you! The audiences were great. I forgot to remind people to not ask my opinion of series in the Must-Read/ Must-Watch panel and, since it was my fault, I gave my opinions. I expect some of those people will be recovering for a while and I’m sorry, but not really. If you will insist on asking me what I think, I’m going to tell you. ^_^

I basically come to Yurithon to give away candy and books, and eat smoked meats (Montreal’s version of pastrami, essentially) and at Biiru, so all objectives were achieved.

During the very same weekend, New York City hosted Flamecon and I hope we’ll be getting a report on that later this week, too. I can think of worse ways to spend my Augusts, alternating between Flamecon and Yurithon. ^_^ I hope to see more of you in both places~!





July 9th is the deadline for the 100 Years of Yuri Tour!

July 1st, 2019

 July 9th is the absolute last-chance to sign up for the 100 Year of Yuri Tour of Tokyo!
We’re going to be shopping at stores for Yuri manga and goods, hitting up key places from Yuri anime. We’ll have lectures about Yuri history and hopefully a couple of guests will join us for some chats on Yuri!

PacSet Travel has arranged a onsen resort trip and a lot of fun shopping and eating…we even have a Takarazuka show option, of course. ^_^

Okazu Patrons get a $100 off the deposit and a very spiffy custom-designed t-shirt. ^_^

This is a no-joke once-in-a-lifetime event. We’ve got a few places still open so don’t let this opportunity pass!





100 Years of Yuri Events Schedule Update

June 16th, 2019

I’ve updated my 100th Anniversary of the Yuri Genre speaking schedule. I’ll be at the following events:

Yurithon, Montreal, Quebec, Canada. August 16-18, 2019, Palais des congrès de Montréal.

Crunchyroll Expo, San Jose, CA, USA. August 30 – September 1, 2019. San Jose Convention Center

100 Years of Yuri Tour, Tokyo Japan – September 8-16, 2019. Sign-up deadline is July 9th. We hope you can join us for this historical event!

Michigan State University, Michigan. October 14-16, 2019.

AnimeNYC, New York City. November 15-17, 2019. Javits Convention Center

If you wish to have me talk at your event, school or organization, please contact me!





Yuriten 2019 in Fukuoka Guest Report by Jenn O.

June 5th, 2019

Hello everyone and welcome to Guest Report Wednesday on Okazu. Today we’d like to welcome translator Jenn O with this terrific report of the Yuriten final location in Fukuoka. You can find her on j-entranslations.com or Twitter.  As always I hope you’ll give her a warm welcome and positive comments. Take it away Jenn!

I’m Jennifer, a game localizer and nerd who loves exciting adventure as well as cute LGBT romances. Currently residing in Japan and buying more manga and books than my apartment can hold. I had no idea the Yuri fair Yuriten was even a thing until it popped up as a retweet on Fukuoka city’s Twitter. But I was pleasantly surprised when it did! A ten-day long pop-up shop and exhibition dedicated to all things Yuri? Sign me up!

Fukuoka is a reasonably small city (compared to Tokyo and Osaka at least), so Yuriten was not hard to find. It was on the second floor of the Tenjin Core building. The moment I went in, there were posters and a small display directing people to the second floor. So that even people who had no idea it was there would have their curiosity sparked.

I honestly didn’t know what to expect when I went but was taken aback by three things in particular; the size, the content, and the people.

Yuriten Fukuoka was surprisingly small, certainly smaller in comparison to past Yuriten reviewed on Okazu, tucked away in the corner of this mall. Half of it was an exhibition of art and photography from Yuri manga, games, and photo books. Because the space was so small the exhibition consisted of a small corridor that winded in on itself, with the pictures lining the white walls.

It was interesting to see the variety of approaches to Yuri narratives. Some were clearly aimed more for male audiences while others were more vanilla. Most were titles I’d read or heard of, but it was a nice surprise to see a few I hadn’t. Seeing the large prints of the various art styles also made it easier to pick out some new titles.

There were a few artistic photographs that I didn’t feel comfortable with. Or perhaps didn’t know how to feel about? There a few that were photos of schoolgirls thighs, and one that was borderline sexual between two girls in sexy costumes. It felt like there were a few that were aimed at men, rather than celebrating Yuri-ness. These mostly consisted of photos or manga that had young attractive girls who were constantly kissing. Whereas I was drawn more to the cute daily life style images between women.

The corridor ended back out into the second half of Yuriten, which was a shop with mostly manga as well as some other goods. All the manga and games featured in the art exhibition were waiting at the end, ready for you to buy! Including some more unexpected surprised. Such as Stjepan Sejic’s lesbian BDSM comic Sunstone!

Sunstone is a particular favorite of mine and if you’re a fan of fun, witty, sexy stories with amazing art, then I highly recommend it! I knew the first volume at least had been translated into Japanese (because I picked it up at Village Vanguard) but was thrilled to see they had volumes 1-6 available at Yuriten in Japanese!

Anyway, there was a lot of Yuri. But more than that, you could actually get signed copies! Specifically you had to go at the start of the day of the last Saturday or Sunday and get a lottery ticket due to limited signed copies. Yuriten listed on their Twitter which days had which manga, and the details for entering. I decided not to go get something signed in the end but I kind of wish I had.

Which brings me onto my third surprise: the people. I think I was expecting to see a lot of men but was pleasantly surprised to see a number of women too! I would say about half were men, and half were women. They were by themselves or in pairs.

I overheard a few of the girls talking about their preferences for stories and images. (Wish I had eavesdropped a little more.) It was also great to see people’s excitement and the massive wall of manga.

Around the corner between the manga and the entrance to the exhibition was a little display of artwork made specially for Yuriten, and a massive wall of post-it-notes. People wrote out little messages, or art, or just expressed their joy for Yuri. And it was massive. Yuriten tweeted the wall at the end of the 10 days and it was completely full.

People clearly enjoyed themselves.

Yuriten is nothing big or fancy, but I do think it was special. It was the highlight of my day at least. It’s a celebration of Yuri for all genders. Even if you don’t know Japanese, if you love Yuri it’s worth tracking down what city they’re going to next and checking it out if you’re in the area.

Erica here: Thank you so much Jenn for this report! We had three of 5 events covered this year, and each time it just seems that people were really loving it. I love the idea of a traveling Yuri exhibit and pop-up shop. And I’m pretty stoked to see Sunstone in the mix. Thanks again for letting us walk around with you.





Toronto Comics Arts Festival 2019, Day 2

May 13th, 2019

Sunday started with breakfast. It is the most important meal of the day. Well, it is for me, I need that coffee. 

I finally had a chance to actually go around the festival, so I did. ^_^ I picked up a bunch of stuff, like Laura Dean Keeps Breaking up With Me by Rosemary Valero-O’Connell and Mariko Tamaki, Megan Rose Gedris’ Spectacle, and Emily Carroll’s When I Arrived at the Castle (which I forgot to bring to our panel and therefore did not get signed, d’oh.) I also managed a moment to check out the Zine space at Cumberland Terrace, which I missed completely last year.

I was given review copies of Kiss Number 8 by Colleen AF Venable and Ellen T. Crenshaw who, unrelated to this, I had met at barcon this weekend and who were both lovely. The folks from Seven Seas were repped by a well-stocked table at Page and Panel.

 

Some of the Seven Seas ladies who were there gave me a lovely box of chocolates and a copy of Our Dreams at Dusk: Shimanami Tasogare (which I’ve already read and will be reviewing tomorrow. Also a copy of Transparent Light Blue, which I reviewed Friday and Blank Canvas, the comic essay by Jellyfish Princess creator Akiko Higashimura.

 

I was given a copy of Spotted by Jenny McKeon, and I had a lovely conversation with Lianne Sentar and letterer CK Russell, whose work on Kase-san is so excellent. I love these ladies. Much missed was our friend and colleague, Lissa, who was there in spirit, if not in body.

On the floor I picked up Curb Angels by Christopher Ducharme and Lisa Mendis, Box of Bones by Yize Jama-Everett and John Jennings and the Afrofuturism prose anthology [Mothership], both from Rosarium Publishing. I cannot wait to get into those. I also picked up Genesis by  Marta Chudolinska, because her comic work includes prints from woodcuts and linotype.  I was instantly hooked and we briefly chatted about keeping old crafts alive.

I also stopped by the Graphic Medicine table. This is a very fast-growing genre in comics, as all of us tell our stories of illness, disability, aging and the like.

But what did I take on the plane to read? you’re probably not asking, but you should be. On the way up, I read The Stars are Legion by Kameron Hurley and hot damn is it gay good.  ^_^ But the winner of the show for me is Chronin by Alison Wilgus. This story is historical and science fiction and samurai drama and time-travel all at once. It instantly reminded my of Amakusa 1637 (which I never reviewed? I cannot believe that) for many reasons and I can’t wait for the second and final volume. I hope you’ll all take a look at this fun and interesting new comic.

My last panel of the day was a creator spotlight with Emily Carroll who was HILARIOUS. In fact, I was really blessed, both my creator panels were with people who were engaging and funny. Yay!

I had had dinner with my extended Toronto family on Friday, but on Sunday I went out with my boys, Sean Gaffney, Alan Harnum and Merc (who of course has a real name, but I have never once thought of him that way.) We talked Utena as one does and fanfic and other important fandom things. Thanks to them all for taking time to chat with me over Canadian cider and pub food.

My event was capped off with a lovely long conversation with Takashima-sensei, who was so genuinely fun to talk to. We of course talked manga and Yuri and stuff. Many thanks to Mimmy Shen who had to do a lot of work as an interpreter for us and who was both spectacular and fashionable. Takashima-sensei drew an original piece of art for the Yuri exhibit. How lovely is this?

 

I have so many people to thank this year. First, thanks to all the folks who came to our Yuri panels! Your passion and joy was contagious. I love you all. Thanks to the lovely folks at Sparkler Monthly (hi Becca, we hardly had a chance to talk!) and Seven Seas. My admirable and talented roomies, Heidi MacDonald and Deb Aoki, the rest of the Comics Coven, Brigid Alverson and Johanna Draper-Carlson, Sean Kleefeld and Laurieann Davis, Morgana Santilli, Zachary Clemente, all the ALA folks, Gina, Amy and Matt, Erik Ko, and all the TCAF volunteers. My very sincere and special thanks to the many folks at the Japan Foundation, Nobi-san. Ayumi-san, Shimizu-san, thank you so much, you were so welcoming!And my love and devotion to Christopher Butcher and Andrew Woodrow-Butcher for literally everything they did to make the 100 Years of Yuri Exhibit happen.

Thank you Jocelyne Allen and Mimmy Shen for interpreting and being magnificent humans. And thank you Kumagai-san and the Shinsokan folks and thank you so much to Takashima Hiromi-sensei. It was my very sincere pleasure to meet you and speak with you, We will definitely keep in touch.

Thank you all again for reading my TCAF 2019 journal – I hope to see you all there next year.